Mega Chandelure ex deck: the core, the flex slots, and what beats it

What Mega Chandelure ex looks like when you open the box

Across the 33 lists we counted, this deck runs 17 to 23 Pokémon, 27 to 35 Trainers and 7 to 12 Energy. Its attacks are paid for in Psychic.

On results pages and on stream you will see it written « mega-chandelure-ex ». Every card named in that label turns up in the tables below, which is what makes it a fair name for the deck.

Look at the Energy: 7 to 12 out of 60, exactly the median of the 97 decks we track. It draws neither too much nor too little, so this is not where its games are won or lost.

It takes a while to set up. Mega Chandelure ex is a Stage 2 Pokémon: you put down the baby, you evolve it, and then you evolve it again. Three cards stacked before anything attacks. That is what the hardest-hitting decks cost you, and it is also where they crack — a fast opponent can bury you before the line is standing.

Look at the Trainers: 27 to 35 cards out of 60, against a median of 31 across the 97 decks we track. Inside that, 9 to 16 Supporters, and the rule there is strict — one a turn, even if you are holding three. The 8 to 19 Items you can play all of in the same turn. It also brings up to 3 Stadiums, and 91 of the 97 decks we track bring that many or more. Only one Stadium sits on the table at a time: the one you play sends the one already there to the discard pile.

What Tools and Stadiums do — the two Trainer families we skipped here — and why the Energy count says so much: how to read a deck list.

What the card in this deck's name actually does

Mega Chandelure ex gives this deck its name. Here is what is written on it.

Mega Chandelure ex is in all 33 lists, 3 copies of it. Its Ability is called Binding Flame, and here is what is printed on it, word for word: « Your opponent's Active Pokémon's Retreat Cost is {C} more. »

How Mega Chandelure ex actually wins

Mega Chandelure ex attacks with Phantom Maze. It needs 2 Psychic Energy attached, and it has 350 HP. The damage box reads "130+": 130 to start with, and 50 more per Energy the Pokémon across the table needs to retreat.

The cost of Phantom Maze decides your first few turns. You only get to attach one Energy a turn, and that attack asks for 2. On your own attachments alone, your first real swing lands on turn 2. We have not found anything in this list that attaches Energy faster than that, so plan on holding out for a turn before you swing. Those turns still get played: you fill your Bench, you build your lines, and you keep something back to rebuild with when your attacker falls.

Energy is not your only clock. Litwick has to climb two steps before it becomes Mega Chandelure ex, and an evolution asleep at the bottom of your deck does you no good at all. The list has that covered. Hilda, which the list runs 4 of, goes into your deck for an evolution.

Here is the detail that quietly loses games. To pull Mega Chandelure ex back to the Bench you have to discard 2 Energy attached to it. Retreating does not cost you your turn, you can step back and still swing right after. What it costs you is the 2 Energy you spent 2 turns attaching, and you start that climb again from nothing. Pack a card that moves it for free, or send it up knowing it stays up.

Mega Chandelure ex is a Mega Evolution ex, and that is the most expensive rule in the game: your opponent takes 3 Prize cards instead of one the turn it goes down. They need 6 to win the game, so 2 well-placed knockouts on that card beat you, where it would take 6 knockouts anywhere else on your Bench.

The attackers in the deck's core, with their best attack, its cost and their Weakness

Pokémon	HP	Attack	Damage	Cost	Weakness	Retreat
Close Mega Chandelure exStage 2	350	Phantom Maze	130+	Psychic + Psychic	Darkness ×2	2
Close LitwickBasic	70	Will-O-Wisp	20	Psychic	Darkness ×2	1

The core: the 10 cards every list runs

These 10 cards appear in all 33 lists, without a single exception. That is 34 of the 60 slots. The other 26 are decided player by player.

Look at how those 34 slots break down: 17 Trainers, 11 Pokémon, 6 Energy. Trainers outweigh everything else put together, which is the mark of a deck that goes and fetches its cards rather than waiting to draw them.

10 of those 10 cards do not sit at the same count from list to list: Lampent (2 to 4), Litwick (2 to 4) and Mega Chandelure ex (2 to 4), plus 7 more. Add those spreads up and you get 20 copies the 33 lists do not agree on, inside the core itself.

What "3 to 4" means in the copies column, what the "TWM 130" code under each name is for, and why we count dozens of lists instead of one: how to read a deck list.

The cards present in every list counted, with the number of copies

Copies	Card	Printing	Kind	Rotation
2–4	Close Lampent	PBL 37	Pokémon	stays
2–4	Close Litwick	PBL 36	Pokémon	stays
2–4	Close Mega Chandelure ex	PBL 38	Pokémon	stays
2–4	Close Boss's Orders	MEG 114	Trainer	stays
3–4	Close Hilda	WHT 84	Trainer	stays
2–4	Close Poké Pad	POR 81	Trainer	stays
2–4	Close Rare Candy	MEG 125	Trainer	stays
1–3	Close Night Stretcher	ASC 196	Trainer	leaves
2–4	Close Telepathic Psychic Energy	POR 88	Energy	stays
1–4	Psychic Energy	MEE 5	Energy	stays

The 63 cards that change from list to list

63 cards fight over the 26 slots that are left: 7 above three lists in four, 47 below one in four, and the percentage on each row says how many players took it.

The most agreed on first: Lillie's Determination at 97 %, Air Balloon at 97 % and Chandelure at 94 %, plus 4 more above 75 %. Add those to the core and you have the common build.

The dividing line runs through Clefairy, at 45 %: 15 of 33 players took it, 18 put something else there. The ones who run it bring 1 copy. Right at the bottom of the table, Psyduck (8 lists out of 33) and Lillie's Clefairy ex (7 lists out of 33).

Why a card at 45 % is not a bad card, and what order to buy all this in: how to read a deck list.

The cards some lists run and others don't, most common first

Lists running it	Card	Copies	Printing	Kind
97 %32/33	Close Lillie's Determination	3–4	MEG 119	Trainer
97 %32/33	Close Air Balloon	1–3	ASC 181	Trainer
94 %31/33	Close Chandelure	2–4	TWM 38	Pokémon
94 %31/33	Fire Energy	2–3	MEE 2	Energy
85 %28/33	Close Xerosic's Machinations	1–3	SFA 64	Trainer
82 %27/33	Close Elgyem	1–2	BLK 40	Pokémon
76 %25/33	Close Comfey	1–2	SCR 63	Pokémon
73 %24/33	Close Buddy-Buddy Poffin	2–4	TEF 144	Trainer
73 %24/33	Close Lana's Aid	1–2	TWM 155	Trainer
70 %23/33	Close Shaymin	1	DRI 10	Pokémon
70 %23/33	Close Ultra Ball	1–4	MEG 131	Trainer
58 %19/33	Close Maractus	1	JTG 8	Pokémon
45 %15/33	Close Clefairy	1	POR 30	Pokémon
42 %14/33	Close Legacy Energy	1	TWM 167	Energy
30 %10/33	Close Dawn	2–3	PFL 87	Trainer
30 %10/33	Close Neo Upper Energy	1	TEF 162	Energy
24 %8/33	Close Psyduck	1	ASC 39	Pokémon
21 %7/33	Close Lillie's Clefairy ex	1	JTG 56	Pokémon
18 %6/33	Close Pokégear 3.0	1–4	SVI 186	Trainer
15 %5/33	Close Fezandipiti ex	1	ASC 142	Pokémon
15 %5/33	Close Battle Cage	2–3	PFL 85	Trainer
15 %5/33	Close Team Rocket's Watchtower	1–2	DRI 180	Trainer
15 %5/33	Close Wondrous Patch	1–3	PFL 94	Trainer
15 %5/33	Close Handheld Fan	1–2	TWM 150	Trainer
12 %4/33	Close Drakloak	2–3	TWM 129	Pokémon
12 %4/33	Close Dreepy	2–3	TWM 128	Pokémon
12 %4/33	Close Dragapult ex	1	TWM 130	Pokémon
12 %4/33	Close Wally's Compassion	1–2	MEG 132	Trainer
12 %4/33	Close Miracle Headset	1	SSP 183	Trainer
9 %3/33	Close Budew	1	ASC 16	Pokémon
9 %3/33	Close Dedenne	1	SSP 87	Pokémon
9 %3/33	Close Flutter Mane	1	TEF 78	Pokémon
9 %3/33	Close Nighttime Mine	2–3	ASC 197	Trainer
9 %3/33	Close Gravity Gemstone	1	SCR 137	Trainer
9 %3/33	Close Jacinthe	1	POR 75	Trainer
9 %3/33	Close Mystery Garden	1–3	MEG 122	Trainer
9 %3/33	Close Prime Catcher	1	TEF 157	Trainer
9 %3/33	Close Strange Timepiece	1–3	MEG 128	Trainer
6 %2/33	Close Chi-Yu	1	MEG 31	Pokémon
6 %2/33	Close Latias ex	1	SSP 76	Pokémon
6 %2/33	Close Meowth ex	1	POR 62	Pokémon
6 %2/33	Close Morty's Conviction	2	TEF 155	Trainer
6 %2/33	Close Accompanying Flute	1	TWM 142	Trainer
6 %2/33	Close Special Red Card	1	CRI 82	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Abra	4	MEG 54	Pokémon
3 %1/33	Close Kadabra	4	MEG 55	Pokémon
3 %1/33	Close Alakazam	3	MEG 56	Pokémon
3 %1/33	Close Duskull	3	PRE 35	Pokémon
3 %1/33	Close Dusclops	2	PRE 36	Pokémon
3 %1/33	Close Dusknoir	2	PRE 37	Pokémon
3 %1/33	Close Cubchoo	1	BLK 25	Pokémon
3 %1/33	Close Mega Diancie ex	1	PFL 41	Pokémon
3 %1/33	Close AZ's Tranquility	1	CRI 76	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Crispin	1	SCR 133	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Energy Search	1	POR 72	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Eri	1	TEF 146	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Powerglass	1	SFA 63	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Redeemable Ticket	1	JTG 156	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Scoop Up Cyclone	1	TWM 162	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Surfer	1	SSP 187	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Team Rocket's Petrel	1	DRI 176	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Unfair Stamp	1	TWM 165	Trainer
3 %1/33	Close Prism Energy	2	ASC 216	Energy

The most common Mega Chandelure ex list, all 60 cards

Here they are in full, ready to build. 34 slots come from the core, the cards all 33 lists run. The remaining 26 come from the table just above, working down it: the cards the most players chose, each at its most common copy count, until the total lands on 60.

This list is nobody's list in particular. It takes, slot by slot, what the most people played, under the guardrails a judge would hold you to: never more than four copies of a card, and one ACE SPEC. Behind the core it took 13 more cards to reach 60. The whole thing comes to 21 Pokémon, 30 Trainers and 9 Energy.

One thing to know before you build it: the 33 lists we counted are all from players who came in the top twenty of their tournament. Nobody publishes the lists of the players who lost. So what you have in front of you is what the players finishing near the top bring most often.

One thing to fix before you play: there is no ACE SPEC card in these 60. Players split that slot so many ways that none of their cards climbed high enough to get in, and 33 of the 33 lists carry one. Take Legacy Energy, the most chosen, and drop a card from the bottom of the table to make room.

The text under the table is the one the game expects: copy it, paste it into the deck manager, and the list builds itself.

There is no price total on this page. The readings we have are Cardmarket's, in euros, and the shop link further down sends you to TCGplayer, which quotes in dollars. Putting a euro figure next to a dollar shop would be one currency too many. The French and German pages carry the total.

Why we only read lists from players who came in the top twenty of their tournament, and what that changes about every percentage on this page: how to read a deck list.

Pokémon: 21
4 Lampent PBL 37
4 Litwick PBL 36
3 Mega Chandelure ex PBL 38
4 Chandelure TWM 38
1 Elgyem BLK 40
2 Comfey SCR 63
1 Shaymin DRI 10
1 Maractus JTG 8
1 Clefairy POR 30

Trainer: 30
4 Boss's Orders MEG 114
4 Hilda WHT 84
4 Poké Pad POR 81
3 Rare Candy MEG 125
2 Night Stretcher ASC 196
4 Lillie's Determination MEG 119
2 Air Balloon ASC 181
2 Xerosic's Machinations SFA 64
2 Buddy-Buddy Poffin TEF 144
1 Lana's Aid TWM 155
2 Ultra Ball MEG 131

Energy: 9
4 Telepathic Psychic Energy POR 88
2 Psychic Energy MEE 5
3 Fire Energy MEE 2

Total Cards: 60

Which decks beat Mega Chandelure ex at tournaments

Here is how Mega Chandelure ex did against every other deck at tournaments. Real games, real players sitting across the table from each other, and the platform those tournaments run on counts them one by one. All of them were played after Pitch Black became legal for tournaments, and we read the table on 5 September 2026.

The format matters more than people think. When the next set lands, decks get rebuilt around the new cards, and a matchup that leaned one way can swing the other. What you are reading holds for today's format.

We start with the opponent that gives you the most trouble, because that is where the work is before your next tournament. The further down the list you go, the better it goes for you.

Always look at the number of games next to the score. Six wins out of ten happens on its own, even with a middling deck: it is the same as flipping six heads in ten tries. Six hundred out of a thousand, and luck has nothing to do with it. Below 100 games we show nothing at all, because at that count half the matchups look like they lean one way when they lean nowhere.

Against Festival Lead: over 127 games, 40 won and 86 lost. One ended with no winner.

Against Alakazam / Dudunsparce: over 104 games, 39 won and 65 lost.

Against Dragapult ex / Dusknoir: over 108 games, 45 won and 62 lost. One ended with no winner.

Against Dragapult ex: over 160 games, 75 won and 84 lost. One ended with no winner.

Against Dragapult ex / Blaziken ex: over 116 games, 54 won and 60 lost. 2 ended with no winner.

Against Mega Excadrill ex: over 142 games, 91 won and 51 lost.

What Mega Chandelure ex costs to build, and how long it will last

You need 73 different cards to cover every version of this deck, 10 of which nobody argues about. We do not have card prices, so we are not going to put a number on it.

All 33 lists bring an ACE SPEC, and that is where they part ways: 14 took Legacy Energy, 10 took Neo Upper Energy and 4 took Miracle Headset. The flex table shows you all 6. You are allowed ONE ACE SPEC card in your whole deck, so a single copy covers it whatever it costs. New to this deck? Take Legacy Energy and watch what the others do with theirs before you switch.

Then there is time. 1 of the 10 core cards carries the letter H, the one that goes at the next rotation: Night Stretcher. The core table marks it. In copies, that is 2 of the 34 slots the core fills. Which day it lands, we do not know yet.

What Mega Chandelure ex struggles against

The attackers in this deck are Weak to Darkness, so they take DOUBLE damage from that type. 13 of the 97 decks we track attack in exactly that type.

Concretely, here is what is waiting for you: N's Zoroark ex, Marnie's Grimmsnarl ex / Froslass and Team Rocket's Honchkrow, plus 10 more decks. The table below takes them one at a time, and those are the lists you practise against first before an event.

This table counts one thing, Weakness, and that comes to 13 decks out of the 97 we track. The other 84 do not attack into yours, and this table says nothing about them. You will still run into them.

Going the other way, your attackers are Psychic, and 6 of the decks we track have an attacker Weak to one of those: Mega Lucario ex, Mega Lucario ex / Hariyama and Greninja ex, among others. That is you doubling, for once. Second half of the table.

Questions people ask

What is the Mega Chandelure ex deck list?

There isn't one, so we built one for you: all 60 cards are written out further up this page. Across 33 tournament lists harvested between 11 August 2026 and 5 September 2026, 10 cards turn up in every single one, 34 slots out of 60. The remaining 26 change from player to player, with 63 different cards competing for them. Both tables are above.

How many lists is this counted on, and where do they come from?

33 lists, played across 30 different tournaments, harvested between 11 August 2026 and 5 September 2026 from play.limitlesstcg.com. All 33 were read card by card, and every card recognised.

Where do I start if I want to build Mega Chandelure ex?

With the whole core: 10 cards, 34 slots. Inside it, buy the 17 Trainer slots and the 6 Energy first: they carry over into your next deck. Leave the 11 Pokémon slots for last. Only then work down the flex table and add the cards the most lists agree on, starting with Lillie's Determination at 97 % and Air Balloon at 97 %.

What beats Mega Chandelure ex?

Its attackers are Weak to Darkness, so they take double damage from an attacker of that type. 13 of the 97 decks we track play an attacker of that type: N's Zoroark ex, Marnie's Grimmsnarl ex / Froslass, Team Rocket's Honchkrow and Mega Absol ex, among others.

Will Mega Chandelure ex survive the next rotation?

Not intact: 1 core cards out of 10 carry the letter H, starting with Night Stretcher.

Are a lot of people playing Mega Chandelure ex?

We have read 33 lists of it, which puts it 37th of the 97 decks we track by lists read. The platform those tournaments run on counts 464 entries for it, 1.14 % of the field, across all its players. That figure is theirs.

These pages are about the same corner of the game. If you came away from this one still wondering about something, start with one of them.